More Than Words
by EmAusHotchUs
Summary: "It doesn't matter if you screw up… all that matters to me is that you just keep trying." A chance encounter in a bar leads to something that is going to give two profilers a second chance at love. Hotch/Emily


_Pairing: Aaron Hotchner/Emily Prentiss_

_ Spoilers: Everything up to Season 8._

_ Rating: Heavy M for adult content, swearing, and violence. _

_** Author's Note:** There is so much to say about this piece and how it came to be. First and Foremost, it should be noted that this project is the melding of two authors on here that met through a weird coincidence on Facebook and eventually came together to write this. You may know us as **BabyGurl0506** and **ProfilingHotly**. This has really been a tremendous experience for both of us and we are so excited to share this little jewel with you. _

_ The premise of this piece is built around an A/U where the following is true:_  
_ 1\. Emily never left the BAU. She never went to London. _  
_ 2\. Hotch and Beth did date, but it was never as serious as the show made it out to be._  
_ 3\. Strauss is still alive and cantankerous as ever._  
_ 4\. Savannah, Morgan's girlfriend doesn't exist._  
_ 5\. Jack is still canon to his age on the show; 8 turning 9._  
_ 6\. While Hotch has continued to grow, he's also been warming up a bit in this universe and has changed in ways that the show isn't reflecting. _

_ Gentle warning that there will be swearing, adult content, violence, and lots of fluff and angst. It's a wild ride and we're really excited for everyone to come along on it with us. Please leave us reviews, comments, concerns, anything. We would love to hear your feedback, even if you're just dropping by to say hi._

_ Disclaimer: We own nothing except for the DVDs._

* * *

His eyesight was starting to blur as he stared long and hard at the typed words on the page. The words turning fuzzy in front of his eyes the harder he stared, and he realized he was really just wasting his time. He was tired, h. He was hungry and he knew that the longer he sat here the worse it would get. He blinked his eyes hard and chanced a glance out the window, staring out into the dark deserted bullpen and taking a long breath. He massaged the back of his neck and scrubbed a hand over his face as he yawned widely and rubbed his eyes with his fingertips, trying to wake himself. He dropped his head again and began focusing on the papers in front of him once more.

/Finish this file, Hotchner. Finish this then you can leave./

Another hour passed and he wasn't even close to being finished with the swarms of case files that were piled in his office. In fact, he had actually packed some up and put them in his car to take them home with him. He yawned again and swore slightly at himself. He was worn out, burned out, just plain tired. Not only tired from the day's work but , tired from everything in his life. Jack was growing up before his eyes, and he couldn't even make it home fast enough to see him before his bedtime.

He carried his work inside and found Jessica, Jack's aunt and babysitter asleep on the couch. He heavily sighed. She probably knew about his eight8 year old more than he did. Aaron absolutely hated being a lousy father, but he was trying his best. He emptied his pockets out on the dining room table and stared down hard at his picture I.D. thinking hard about what his life hadas come to. A big dead end. He walked into his son's room and stood over him with a soft smile upon his face. Jack seemed so peaceful. He wondered how his day went, he wish he knew. He kissed his forehead and cracked left the door open a crack, to his room, leaving a shift of light in his son's otherwise darkened sanctuary, taking a moment to and leaned against the wall. for a moment. Haley would be kicking his ass right now if she was still alive. She'd be beating him senseless asking why he wasn't taking care of their son the way he should've been, n; asking why he wasn't keeping his promise.

He went to his own bedroom and looked at himself in the mirror as he removed his tie. Who the hell was Aaron Hotchner? An uninvolved, workaholic father? A lonely guy? A single man with too much baggage for one woman to ever desire? He changed quickly from his work clothes into something more relaxed before grabbing his keys deciding to take a drive downtown to a place he knew well. It wasn't often that he did this sort of thing. Maybe once every three3 months,; four4 times a year, he allowed himself to be human.

He parked in the back lot and headed into the bar in confident, strong strides. It wasn't until he'd gotten to the corner booth hidden in mostly shadow that he looked around the bar, his powder blue shirt tucked into his black jeans and a tumbler of whiskey on the table in front of him. He needed a break tonight. A break form being a failure of a father, a break from being the unshakeable unit chief Aaron Hotchner. He needed to just be a man tonight.

Night's like these usually ended in one of two ways.

Either he'd go home with someone who was clearly looking for nothing more than one night of physical, aggressive, rough sex. Someone who would let him take complete control and break them with his need to forget everything he'd seen. Or he'd end up going home by himself and working himself in a frenzy in the bathroom, lubricating himself up and stroking himself to a lonely and hollow completion.

He downed the rest of his glass and slid it to the edge of the table, before flagging his waitress down and asking for her to keep them coming. He wondered silently for a moment, whatt would his team would think of him if they saw him like this; what would other agents would think of the BAU's A Team Unit Chief looking for his own human release, his own booty call. His eyes traced the bar's surroundings and he huffed lightly. He'd find someone in here. He had to.

Tonight, he needed to forget and just feel.

* * *

She had left work at 5pm on the dot that night. It was unusual for her to be the first one packed up and out the door, but tonight Emily Prentissshe had a date., Oone that she'd been growing progressively more nervous about us the hours had rolled on.

It was her fourth date with this particular gentleman. And he had so far proven himself as that; Damian was a respectable, forty-something divorcee who worked as an accountant in a large city firm. He had brought her flowers on their first date and taken her out to a trendy Michelin star restaurant that she'd never heard of. He hadn't pushed his luck either, which was something that had earned major brownie points with her. Unlike the gaggle of previous men she'd dated within the past few years, he hadn't given her the impression that he believed that him simply taking her out for a nice meal because he expectedwould result in him return toconsequently getting laid.

That was incredibly uncommon.

For the first time, in a long time, she'd met a man who seemed d… decent. He was intelligent , and funny, and really not sore on the eyes either. She'd been counting her lucky stars, wondering what on God's name she'd done to finally have things starting to work for her.

However on their third date as they'd been driving home and he turned into her street, he'd said he was really wanting to take things a bit more seriously. So far their conversations had been relatively light. Emily had been able to avoid revealing the nature of her own line of work and had only been called away on a case once in the time of their acquaintance.

She'd twiddled her fingers nervously, as he'd spoken and agreed to his desire to try for them to be more vulnerable on this next date.

And later that night she'd found herself in her apartment having a relative panic attack as she realised that this good thing was all too quickly coming to an end, and there was nothing she could do about it.

Because in all of her dating experience since she'd moved to Washington, as soon as she'd revealed that she hunted the nation's most perverse murderers and sociopaths for a living, her dates had either gone went running to for the hills or shown exposed their own sick level of fascination in with the topic; w. Wanting to know everything from the mundane "had she ever shot anyone" to the more disturbing "was it true about that case in Ohio where the guy made his victims eat their own fingers before killing them?"

So the ominous date was scheduled for the following Wednesday after that otherwise dreamy evening. On the Tuesday, however, the team had been called away on a case in Miami, and Emily had secretly been thankful for the reprieve, and thought that perhaps things maybe would work out this time e… and someone up there was trying to give her the time she needed to make this work.

However those thoughts quickly fell away , after she was forced to reschedule a second and then a third time. Back to back cases in Chicago and New York, a serial rapist and LDSK shooter respectively, had kept her away from home for almost four weeks straight.

Her potential Prince Charming had been understanding at first, but as the time started to slip by, she knew that his responses to her were becoming less and less genuine, and more and more polite.

He was too nice of a guy to break up with her over the phone.

She was pretty sure he was just waiting her out so they could meet up for coffee and he could tell her that he was sorry, but he just couldn't see this working out.

Or worse- by some miracle he'd still be interested and then she'd have to sit there and open up about how she'd spent most of the past eight days chasing a guy who'd shot fourteen children in retaliation to his ex-wife taking full custody of their child.

So she'd rushed home from work and set about scrubbing herself up the best she could. She made time to shower properly; washing her hair out, exfoliating, showeringshaving; … she even broke out her new bottle of coconut and vanilla body wash. She'd dried and moisturized every inch of skin, curled her hair, tweezed her brows and done did her full face of make up.

Pretty much she was giving it all or nothingit her all, because really- that was just about the only choice she had left. , with the way she was going it didn't get much better than this.

She'd chosen an understated black bodycon dress t, that had three quarter length sleeves, fell just to the knee but and had a low open back. It was elegant, but showed off just the right amount of skin to help her radiate that quintessential 'je ne sais quoi'.

Emily Shehad met Damian at their uptown restaurant reservation a little after seven o'clock in the evening.

And really, the way his eyes had roamed up and down her body appreciatively when he first saw her walk through the doorway was the highpoint of the night.

It all went downhill from there.

They'd barely had one drink before Damian confessed that he didn't think he could see much of a future with a woman who spent so much time away from home, unless it was for a very good cause.

Subsequently, Emily was left with little choice but to reveal all she'd been trying to evade keep evasive in a single two-minute spiel, and her six-foot four date basically couldn't have gotten out of there any quicker.

So Tthree hours and half a box of Kleenex later, Emily found herself in a seedy corner bar just a few blocks from her place. She hadn't ever been to this particular establishment, but she was just in such dire need of a drink that she really hadn't cared about the vermin she knew were slinking along the walls of this joint.

She just couldn't bear to stay home alone wallowing her own self-pity.

On arrival she'd had two straight shots of tequila, the liquid instantly swimming through her system due to the lack of food in her stomach, causing a nice fog to settle across her mind.

About a half hour and another two drinks later, some brute who had clearly already been trying to work the room who already had his hand resting on top of her leg had sat by her and offered to buy her another drink. He stank of arrogance; wearing a tight V-neck tee shirt that showed off his clearly well maintained physique and a smile that said 'tonight I've chosen you. I dare you to reject me.'

Normally this kind would send Emily reeling, but she honestly had no energy or fire in her anymore.

Maybe this was all she was really good enough for?

Working by day to rid the earth of this scum, and spending nights alone or in the arms of strangers who'd be gone by daylight.

So that was how she found herself practically gyrating against him on the dance floor. Her arms clenching the back of his neck, scratching into the hair at his nape as his hands rested assuredly on her shapely ass.

She could see the lust and determination in his eyes, and she knew she was going home with this man tonight- and against her better conscience she was really just too buzzed to care.

* * *

**_A/N: _**_We'd love to hear your thoughts, so if you have some time please drop us a review :)_  
_ A lot of angst and steamy scenes coming up in the next few chapters._


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